“When they are grown-up ladies, can we tell them then and let them decide whether they want to meet or not?” Arabella asked in shyness.
Hannah’s dark brows knit together in a frown. It had not been arrogance or uppitiness that she’d seen in the woman that day in the courtroom. Marty had already started the process of teaching her submission. The fact that Hannah was not rich and didn’t have the upper-class social skills had nothing to do with the situation. Arabella had those things, but he’d still managed to control her.
“He looks for vulnerable women. I bet you are basically pretty shy, right?” Hannah asked.
“Always have been.”
“And you have money?”
“My mother’s people were very wealthy, from oil. My dad was a professor in Mexico City. I moved to Fort Worth for a year to help set up an oil company. I wanted a change—look what it got me.”
Hannah set the sandwich and the milk in front of Arabella. “And he sweet-talked you, sent flowers and candy and expensive presents?”
Arabella bit into the sandwich and chewed fast. She swallowed and sipped the milk. “Yes. All of the above. My first present was a lovely diamond necklace with my and his initials interlocked together. He insisted I wear it to the wedding, but I ripped it off and threw it on the floor before I walked out.”
“He’s upped his game. I didn’t get diamonds.” Hannah smiled for the first time. “Does he know your grandmother’s name and where she lives?”
Arabella nodded. “He knows. But Mama Lita—that’s what we call my abuela—would love to take care of him in such a way they would never find his body.”
“Enough said.” Hannah pulled the brownies from the oven and set them on a hot pad in the middle of the table.
“Not quite enough said. I’ve been a fool. You are a very kind woman for letting me stay and believing my story. I don’t think I could do that if the tables were reversed. I want you to know that if he ever makes things rough for you, all you have to do is call a number I will leave with you. I will send two very responsible people to bring you and your daughter to Mexico or Mama Lita will take care of it permanently. Your choice.”
The laughter that escaped Hannah was both edgy and nervous. “That sounds . . .”
Arabella nodded. “I know, but it is the truth. She is very, very powerful. I hope I can learn how to be more like her and less gullible in the future.”
“Hey, anybody home?” Travis poked his head in the kitchen.
Hannah smiled. “This is Arabella. She is here until Tuesday morning. And to get it all out in the open, she was about to marry Marty and got smart at the last minute. Arabella, this is one of my lifelong friends, Travis.”
Travis stopped in the middle of the floor. “And you are fine with this?”
“Yes, I am,” Hannah said. “Aunt Birdie has gone to the church to get her something to wear other than that wedding dress. I just hope Sophie doesn’t wake up until she gets changed out of it.”
Travis pulled out a chair and sat down. “Better hide it or Sophie will want to play dress-up in the thing.”
“Can I send it down to your church clothing closet?” Arabella said. “I don’t ever want to see it or the shoes again.”
Hannah brought out a knife and cut the brownies into squares. “Milk, coffee, or tea.”
Travis poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at the end of the table. “I don’t know if I’m pleased to meet you, but if Hannah is comfortable with you staying here, then I trust her judgment.”
“Well, I’m very glad to be here. Away from Martin and that horrible paper I signed. I’m such an idiot,” Arabella said.
“Hey, we don’t allow that kind of talk in this house,” Hannah said. “You are free from abuse from this moment on. Life is what you make it. You can fall back into the hands of another man like Marty, or you can learn from this experience and raise your daughter to be independent and sassy.” She quoted the words from her handbook almost word for word, but they came straight from her heart.
“You sound like Mama Lita. I hope my daughter is just like her. My folks were killed in an accident when I was thirteen, and she finished raising me. She and my mother were both very strong willed, but my father was a shy man. I wish I’d gotten more of Mama Lita’s strength and a little less of my father’s introverted qualities,” Arabella said.
“You have almost no accent,” Travis said.
“I came to Texas to go to college and afterward stayed to run a portion of our business here. Little by little I lost the accent and replaced it with Texan,” Arabella said. “Martin’s family did some of our banking, and I was invited to one of their parties last year. I didn’t decide to go until the very last minute. How did you meet him, Hannah? At a party also?”
Hannah smiled. “Oh, no. He was in a minor fender bender and came to the emergency room to get checked. I wasn’t even supposed to be working the admissions desk that night.”
“What are you going to name the baby?” Travis lifted the first brownie out of the pan.
“My grandmother is Isabella Gonzales and my mother was Maria Fiona, so her full name will be Fiona Isabella Gonzales. I will choose her christening name on the day that we take her to the church or when Abuela brings the priest to the house to do that ceremony. I hope my daughter gets your kindness in her heart and my grandmother’s sass in her head. Then she will never be led astray by a man like Martin Ellis,” Arabella said.
Travis chuckled. “Well, that’s as good as a slap in old Marty’s face. But I thought the baby was a boy. That’s what Marty told Hannah when he filed for divorce. He said that he found a woman who was equal to him in society and that y’all were having a boy.”
It was Arabella’s turn to giggle. “He was wrong on both counts. Martin Ellis is nobody in my grandmother’s world.”
Aunt Birdie carried a paper bag of clothing into the kitchen. “We’re here.”
Miss Rosie trailed along behind her. When she saw Arabella, she clamped a hand over her mouth. “Oh. My. Goodness. You look like you are about to have that baby right now.”
Hannah made introductions. “This is Aunt Birdie, my great-aunt, and this is Miss Rosie, Travis’s grandmother.” She turned and nodded toward Arabella and introduced her.
“I’m pleased to meet you both. I’ll be in Mexico in a few days, so keep your fingers crossed that my baby doesn’t come before then.”
Aunt Birdie handed off the bag to Hannah with a nod to Arabella. “You’ll be a lot more comfortable if you get out of that dress.”
Hannah motioned for Arabella to follow her. “I’ll show you to your room.”
Arabella made her way out of the chair with one hand on her stomach and the other on her back. She was almost a head taller than Hannah, and her red hair, styled in a crown of curls, had begun to fall. As she made her way down the hall, she removed the pins holding it in place.
“I haven’t gotten the bed remade. My last guest just left this morning, but you can get dressed and I’ll do that later,” Hannah said.
“It’s a lovely room, so light and airy,” Arabella said. “Will you stay and help me get out of this thing? It’s got so many buttons up the back that I can’t begin to reach all of them.”
“Of course.” Hannah stepped behind her and began undoing all the tiny satin-covered buttons. “It’s a lovely dress. Some girl who can’t afford a nice wedding dress will be delighted to get it.”
“I hope it brings her more happiness than it did me.” Arabella pulled a pair of maternity shorts from the bag and a brightly colored, flowing top that looked as if it came straight from the islands. “And look, they even brought me flip-flops.”
“The right size?” Hannah finished the last button.
“I wear an eight and these are nines, which gives my swollen feet more room. I’m forever in your debt, Hannah.”
Hannah dumped the rest of the clothing on the bed, folded the dress as carefully as possible, and stuffed it into the paper bag.
“There, now Aunt Birdie can take this with her when she leaves.”
“I feel human again, but I have to admit, I’m lost without my phone,” Arabella said. “Before we go back out there, I want to say something. I think fate brought me here to prove that I did the right thing.”
Hannah laid a hand on her shoulder. “I think fate brought you here to show me a lesson. I thought it was because I wasn’t as wealthy or as high on the”—she stopped and swallowed hard—“social ladder as Marty that he treated me like he did. Now I realize that it had nothing to do with status or money. It’s his problem. Not ours.”
“I shouldn’t feel this comfortable with you,” Arabella said.
“Crazy, ain’t it?” Hannah laughed.
It was near midnight when Hannah heard a gentle rap on her bedroom door. She peeked out to find Travis standing there with two bottles of beer and wearing a big smile. He held them up and nodded toward the stairs.
“Can we go out on the porch and talk?” he asked.
She tiptoed down the steps and out onto the porch and sat down beside him. “What do you want to talk about?”
He handed her a bottle of beer. “Arabella.”
“I feel sorry for her. No woman needs to get tangled up with the likes of Marty.”
“But she’s the one who broke up your marriage.”
“For that I can never thank her enough.” Hannah laughed. “My marriage was over long before she came into Marty’s sight. I just couldn’t figure out a way to end it and keep Sophie. I owe that woman.”
“Do you even know who she is?”
Hannah turned up the bottle and gulped twice. “She’s the one who saved my life, my heart, and my soul.”
“She is Isabella Gonzales’s granddaughter.”
“And that means what?”
“Just that Isabella is the grand matriarch of a powerful family down there. Nobody messes with her. Marty had better leave Arabella alone,” Travis explained. “Remember my second book?”
“Oh!” Hannah gasped. “You researched her grandmother, didn’t you?”
Travis nodded. “I even met her once for a short interview. She’s short and very proper, and she’s got red hair like her granddaughter. It was like meeting the queen. And believe me, her dark eyes don’t miss a thing.”
“Do you think Marty knew?”
“Of course he knew. To have a woman with that kind of background and standing under his thumb would have been a big thing in his eyes,” Travis said. “But he was an idiot. When her grandmother finds out that he slapped Arabella, he could be a dead man. But that’s not the only reason I wanted to talk to you. I want to know if you are all right with this. You’ve been doing so good, Hannah. I don’t want you to take two steps back.”
“It’s brought me more closure than anything.” She took another drink from the bottle. “Money and social class have nothing to do with him treating either of us like that. So it’s him, not me.”
He scooted over closer to her, draped an arm around her shoulders, and used the other hand to tip her chin up. “Then I appreciate her being here.” He lowered his lips to hers.
The kiss started off sweet but deepened into a hot, passionate blending of two lonely hearts. Hannah forgot about Arabella, Marty, and the past in that moment and thought only about the lanky carpenter and author who had been at her side for months. She set the bottle of beer on the porch and shifted her position so she could wrap both arms around his neck and tangle her fingers in his dark hair.
It might not be right so soon after a divorce, but it felt right. With so much serenity in her soul, how could anything be wrong with what they had?
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Sunday morning Hannah made blueberry muffins for breakfast and had just poured herself a cup of coffee when the house phone rang. She answered it on the second ring and hoped that it didn’t wake Arabella. Poor lady needed some uninterrupted sleep after the previous day.
“Hello,” she said.
“It’s Gina, and I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that someone saw that cab leaving the Ellis place in Dallas and Marty tracked it to the shelter. He didn’t show up, but one of his people did, and I assured them that Arabella was not here,” Gina said.
“And the good news?” Hannah asked.
“Arabella’s grandmother called. She is sending a private jet with bodyguards and a doctor to the Dallas airport today. She does not want her granddaughter riding that far in her condition and would rather take a chance on the baby being born on the plane than in a car on the side of the road.”
“What time does she need to be ready to leave?”
“A car will pick her up at noon. That’s all I’ve got. Did things go all right?”
“Talking to her was a blessing, Gina. I’m glad for her stay. Her Mama Lita must love her as much as Aunt Birdie and my mom love me. ’Bye, now,” Hannah said and hit the button to end the call.
“Hey, do I smell muffins?” Travis asked as he headed for the coffeepot.
“Yep,” Hannah said. “And Arabella is leaving at noon. I’m not going to church. I’ll stay here with her. You think Aunt Birdie would mind taking Sophie? They’re getting things ready for the Fourth of July celebration in her Sunday school class.”
“You know Aunt Birdie. She’d take custody of that child if you’d let her.”
“What child?” Sophie yawned as she crawled up in Travis’s lap.
He wrapped his arms around her. “You, of course. Everyone loves you so much that they wish you were their little girl.”
“Even you?” Sophie looked up at him with her dark eyes.
“Especially me. Your mama has to stay with the guest today, but Aunt Birdie will take you to church so you can make your Fourth of July stuff. Did I hear that you are riding on the church float?” Travis asked.
“I am,” she answered seriously. “I get to hold a sparkler all by myself.”
“I’ll have to take a picture of you,” Travis said. “Your mama made muffins. Blueberry. Isn’t that your favorite?”
Sophie giggled. “Yes, it is, and chocolate chip pancakes. Can I have one little sip of your coffee to wake me up?”
“She’s a charmer,” Arabella said as she followed her nose to the coffeepot.
“Good news,” Hannah said and told her about Gina’s call.
Arabella looked up at the ceiling. “Thank you, God! I was dreading that drive down there.”
“God ain’t up in the bedrooms, Bella. It’s funny, ain’t it, Mama—we had a baby Bella in the house last week and now we got a big person Bella. I wish she could stay until her baby gets here so I could play with it. Me and Lullaby would be real careful when we held it. I like that it’s a girl. I wish I had a sister.” Sophie sighed.
“You’ll make a great big sister someday.” Arabella touched her cheek as she sat down at the table with Travis. “And I bet the baby would have dark hair just like you and your mama.”
“I bet your baby has red hair like you,” Sophie said.
“That would be wonderful. I’m so glad I get to fly home. That means I’ll be there by supper time and Mama Lita and I can have a long visit.”
“Mama who?” Sophie asked.
“That is what we call my abuela, which is Spanish for ‘grandmother.’ What do you call your grandmother?” Arabella asked.
“Abuela. Can that be our word for the day, Mama?”
“Yes, it can,” Hannah answered.
“I like the way that the word sounds, but I think I’ll just keep calling my grandmother Granny. She is coming to visit us real soon and she gets to stay in our house this time. She didn’t stay with us before, because it made Father mad to have people messing up the house, but he’s gone now. I thought I’d be sad that he wasn’t coming home anymore, but I’m not,” Sophie said. “I haven’t even told Granny that we named the house, so it’s going to be a surprise. And she hasn’t seen my room and you didn’t say if I can have a sip of your coffee, Uncle Travis.”
“I hope my daughter is just like her.” Arabella laughed.
“Yes, you can have one sip of Uncle Travis’s coffee, but no more than that,” Hannah answered. “Little girls need milk to make their skin pretty and their bones strong.”
“And big girls need coffee so they will be smart, right?” Sophie asked.
“Absolutely.” Arabella raised her cup. “And you can go to church, Hannah. I’ll be fine right here until my people arrive.”
“No, ma’am,” Travis said. “We’ll be here to wave as you leave Crossing. That’s the way we do things.”
At nine thirty, Travis walked Sophie across the street. She wore a cute little sundress and her best white sandals. Her dark ponytail swung from side to side as she skipped along beside him, her hand in his.
“That is one good man,” Arabella said as she waved from the doorway with Hannah right beside her.
“How would we know that with our history?” Hannah asked.
“Maybe since we had such a lousy experience, our eyes have been washed clean and we’re given a clearer vision. Did you ever see Martin hold Sophie like Travis was doing or let her drink from his coffee cup? Did he ever walk her across the street with her little hand tucked in his?”
“No to both,” Hannah answered with honesty.
“I didn’t think so. He talked all the time about interviewing nannies after the wedding so that the baby wouldn’t tie us down and we could continue our lifestyle. That day in divorce court when I saw the fear in your eyes, and then the prenup and the way he slapped me—it all convinced me that I was making the biggest mistake in my life.” She paused. “Travis is a good man who is in love with you.”
“What makes you think that he loves me?”
“It’s written all over his face every time he looks at you. How long have you known him?” Arabella flipped her red hair up in a messy ponytail and secured it with a rubber band.
“All my life. We grew up together right here in Crossing.”
Hannah watched until Travis put Sophie in the backseat of Aunt Birdie’s Caddy and buckled her in. Then he waved until the three of them, Birdie, Rosie, and Sophie, were completely out of sight. After that, he jogged back to Hannah’s house and went straight to his room, saying that he had some reading to catch up on.
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